Thoughts from Mike Lee Remembrance Sunday 2015

“Just so you have a picture of the man you wrote about”

 

The Importance of Personal Photographs in World War 1.

 

Remembrance Sunday 2015

 

“I thought you might like to see the lovely picture of Uncle Jack and Dad in September 2014. Just so you have a picture of the man who you wrote about.” (Email from Rachel McConnell).

 A few weeks ago at a Service of Thanksgiving in St Thomas’ Church for John Leslie (Jack) White, I was honoured to be invited by his brother Arthur White to say a few words about Jack’s war service World War 2. I had never met Jack but I felt I knew him a little better after I had written my piece. But I still had to imagine what he looked like. A few days later I received an email from Arthur’s daughter Rachel which included a photograph. It is a lovely picture of the two brothers which has now become a treasured heirloom for the White family.

For me, seeing the photograph of Jack was a revelation. It made his already amazing story even richer and more real. I now could visualise the man I wrote about. Then, Rachel’s words in her email got me thinking about photographs of the young men and woman of our parishes, about whom I have been documenting and who perished in the Great War (World War 1).

During my researches, I have been able to retrieve quite a lot of information on them. I have also been fortunate in getting hold of portrait photographs of varying quality of most of the boys. But there are some of these young men and young woman, where no photos seem to exist anymore. To us in the 21^st century, we cannot imagine a world without photographs. Digital family photos can be taken instantly, anywhere and at any time and shared by all the family.

But 100 years ago this was not the case. The first thing all the boys, whether private or officer, did after joining up was to visit the portrait photographers. Here, in their newly pressed uniforms, they were immortalised forever, sometimes smiling, in static and heroic poses. These photographs were then given to proud mums and dads and relatives. They would prove that their boys were doing their duty. To be seen to be ‘doing your bit’ was a vital aspect of the formal portrait.

However, by the beginning of the 20^th century, George Eastman had revolutionised amateur photography and cameras were now available to the masses. The Kodak VPK or Vest Pocket Camera was a small bellows type camera which could be folded up and kept in a soldier’s breast pocket. Not much bigger than today’s IPhone, it was known as the Soldier’s camera. These small cameras went to the front in their millions. Although personal photography was an offence in the British Army, many men still took their VPK’s, and today the photographs they took of their friends and comrades in unposed, informal pictures are a rich treasure.

Some soldiers and their mates had themselves photographed in the local photography shops in the villages of France and Flanders. These would be less formal than the portraits taken before they went overseas and would capture forever, the bonds of friendship and shared experience. The soldiers would usually come back some days later to collect the photographs. However, many were never collected and these are the most poignant of all, because hundreds of the smiling boys in them were already dead.

By November 1915, the Great War was fifteen months old and our parishes had already lost ten boys. But only eight of them have known portrait photographs; two do not. Unless their photographs come to light in the future, these boys can only be imagined, as if they never were. There would be more like this in 1916 and the following years. That is the tragedy.

Michael Lee              November 2015